Coffee Prints
Although we have the general concept and impression of what makes an image, photography transforms the 3-dimensional world into a flat 2-dimensional object. It is my opinion that is there is more to this concept of what makes these image. I feel that the viewer needs to focus on subject matter, the process of making a photograph, how the image is constructed, and the space around the image. These ideas very important to my work as a photographer.
As digital photography starts to take control over the mainstream world. We begin to see a disappears in film and film developers. It is in this way I feel that we are losing apart of the past. So I began to look into a new ways of developing film itself. I found that using certain chemicals along with coffee you could develop the film. In this way the coffee act like a developer and using this idea I felt that I could get back the roots of the developing processes of film. The concept and idea started to form the thoughts of what makes a image. Is an image flat or is there more to the idea of what an photograph is? I have always believe that an images are more than 2-dimensional objects. That an image is made up with different textures. Textures that can be found between the emulsion and the layering of the lights and darks. The coffee negatives begin to take on a life of there own, with the coffee creating a new texture on the emulsion. It gives the image feeling that it was taken in the late 1800‘s or early 1900’s.
While working with this process and trying to stay within the confines of photographic realism of the artwork. I think that creating the images in this way might lead to and explore new feelings for the viewer resulting in an image that is images that are three dimensional in appearance and both graphic in style, a and constructed reality, and three dimensional in appearance. In a way this creates an image that is more two and half dimensions in nature. Now these images force the viewer to re-evaluate their perception of space. This expands the image from a two dimensional plane into a space around the image, interlocking the space and idea into one concept that, we can classify as an image. With out this I strongly believe that the focus and meaning is lost to the viewer.